Newton, MA – Julu 10, 2019 – Paytronix Systems, Inc., the most advanced digital guest experience platform, today announced that Duchess Convenience Stores has won the 2019 Paytronix Loyaltee’s Award for Exceptional Customer Engagement. Less than a year after the launch of its revamped loyalty program, Crown Card Rewards, Duchess saw a 125 percent increase in registered members.

Prior to working with Paytronix, Duchess’s loyalty program was a traditional points system which awarded customers points based on purchases that could be redeemed for fuel discounts. Because the margin on fuel is often much lower than in-store products, this proved to be an expensive program structure. In May 2018, Duchess worked with Paytronix to relaunch its loyalty program with a focus more on capturing customers’ behavior to increase incremental visit lift and check spend.

The Crown Card Rewards program now offers discounts on fountain beverages and coffee to encourage customers to become members of the program. Once registered, Duchess is able to see overall customer purchase behaviors and visit trends in order to better engage with guests and target them for specific, relevant campaigns. Accordingly, these campaigns are analyzed and Duchess can narrow down the most effective target groups, types of campaigns, and rewards offered in order to provide the highest ROI. The program yielded some impressive results:

Across the chain, numerous Duchess stores have surpassed their penetration and registration goals of 20 percent, with some locations reaching nearly 40 percent.

The brand has seen a 59 percent lift in penetration year over year since the program relaunch.

Among lapsed customer promotions, Duchess has seen a visit lift of 21 percent and a spend lift of 25 percent.

Through additional benefits such as sweepstakes, members-only pricing, club programs, and in-store redemption items, Duchess has seen the value of the new loyalty program and has far exceeded its previous points-based program. Additionally, increasing vendor partnerships and participation within the Crown Card program has offset some of the cost for Duchess. These program components along with the vendor partnerships have proven effective in increasing monthly visits and incremental check spend while lowering the cost of the program to Duchess.

“Our previous loyalty program was structured in a way that didn’t allow us any insight into customer behavior making it very difficult to engage with them and offer relevant promotions,” said Julia Sacchetti, Duchess Customer Loyalty Specialist. “Since relaunching our Crown Card rewards program we have seen measurable ROI, and due to the data insight from Paytronix we can strategically engage with guests, increasing the value for them while also growing our customer base.”

“With Paytronix’s powerful data insight tools, Duchess is well positioned to get to know more of and engage with its guests while rolling out campaigns that target specific customer segments,” said Michelle Tempesta, head of marketing, Paytronix Systems, Inc. “Duchess has seen tremendous growth with its loyalty program in the last year and we’re excited to continue to help the company understand its customers and grow its business.”

Englefield Oil Company started in 1961 by FW Englefield III with three service stations and an office operating out of his basement. A concept of a full line convenience stores to better serve customers began to form over the years. In 1975, Englefield Oil Co. took a leap of faith and opened the first Duchess Convenience Store in Lancaster, Ohio. Duchess has grown from its very first location to its present-day position as a leading convenience store chain. Today, there are 120 Duchess stores throughout Ohio and West Virginia with annual sales of more than $1 billion. Duchess stores are proud to distribute high performance BP Fuels at the majority of the locations.

Designed to identify the latest trends in restaurant gift card sales and help restaurant marketing executives compare results to others in the industry, use trends for planning inventory, and gain insight into how channel sales contribute to the growth of gift card sales programs, the Paytronix Gift Card Sales Report analyzed more than 190 restaurant brands and 550 stored value program data.